LIttle Bit of This and That

Homeschool is in full swing.
Soccer has officially begun.
Church activities launched 2 weeks ago.
Essays arrive by the hundreds.
Blogging gets a back seat, as usual.

So, here we go with an update; pictures included.

 Juliana's best buddy from church lives very close, is using the same charter school and same curriculum as we are, and is only 6 days older. Okay, that last part didn't really matter. Those factors, and the fact that her mom has been super flexible, have meant the girls have actually managed to get 2 school days together--once at our house and once at theirs. That's close to miraculous for me. 

 Apparently at her house they kicked butt on school--math pages and phonics pages galore, plus memorizing AWANA verses. At our house, ahem, we played with shaving cream and food dye. It was science, and art!

 See, we even found out what happened when we mixed colors. We just did it in a bag full of shaving cream!

 Gabe's room. It rocks. And it is done.  Racing Stripes with Clone Wars stickers on one wall.

 Coolest bed ever across the room.

 A place for wrestling medals and Marvel calendars, plus books and games. 

 And the sports wall is completed with a football player sticker and a Basketball hoop for a laundry basket. 

I have been called a plethora of names lately: Crazy, insane, nuts, super-Mom, even stupid.

I was even told to iron my cape before I hang it up at night.

As if I have time to Iron.

It stems from this sport I love; the same sport that my kids now love: Soccer

Who wouldn't want to coach this adorable player? My favorite things about her team are the hair ribbons I made them all that they adore, and the fact that snack is the best part of soccer.

And here is our little man playing defense. He is hilarious. My favorite part of coaching his team is that the boys all keep perfect score, even though it is non-competitive and we "don't keep score."

Mckenna's games start this Saturday. I am enjoying the challenge of coaching kids who can really learn the sport and improve. Her team is young and small, but filled with spunk and determination. Mckenna, on the other hand, grew inches this summer and will be our rock star goalie and long legged forward. She is also taking piano lessons and loving it, plus running 2 miles every Tuesday with Daddy.

Last week I caught this guy. We got out our ladybug habitat and brought him inside. Appropriately the kids named him Priest. A few clicks of the keyboard revealed he is a carnivore. 3 nights in a row of catching spiders and watching him devour them were bad enough, but when he started boxing the little lid on the top of the enclosure, as if he was thinking: LET ME OUT OF HERE! we decided to let him go.

Little Charmer lost 2 front, bottom teeth. Of course, she just looks more adorable.

2nd Grade Vocabulary

"The sawyers waited for the flood waters to abate."

Me: Gabe, what do you think abate means?

Gabe: Well, it flooded and they needed the waters to go away so they could drive in the Rain Forest. So they are waiting for the water to disappear. So...it must mean "go up into the clouds" because when water evaporates it goes back into the clouds so it can rain again...  Or, maybe it means "to soak in," because some of the water soaks into the ground.... ORRRR, maybe it means "flow to the river," because in the Rain Forest the water flows downhill into the river....

Me: Right........... Well, actually abate means "to go down or recede."

This is my challenge. I love it.

Homeschool 2011-2012, part 3: Gabriel

How is it even possible my son is going to be a Second Grader? Second Grade!

Daniel always says that Gabe makes me look like a great teacher. He is a quick learner, a great memorizer, and an eager student. He excels in math but is also a great reader, except he has inherited or learned a unique trait from his father: guessing at words. They both have an uncanny ability to insert a word that fits the context and starts with the same sound as the word which is actually printed. It's wrong, but truly remarkable.

Fall 2011


Math
Curriculum: Teaching Textbooks 4. Yes, he is doing math 2 years ahead. He could probably do more but eventually we would run out of things to do. It is a blessing and challenge.
Goals: Keep up with him.
Bonus: Same curriculum as Mckenna, spent last year's school money on it.


Language Arts
Curriculum: Moving Beyond the Page. I bought this 2 years ago for Mckenna, but halfway through 2nd grade she went to public school. It's a fantastic curriculum, and very challenging, which I think will be good for him. He is reading: Charlotte's Web, Poppy, One Day in the Tropical Rainforest, The Whipping Boy, 50 American Heros, Sarah Plain and Tall, and Iggie's House. 
Goals: Get him to write longer, neater, and more complex sentences and paragraphs.
Bonus: Already own it. Difficult curriculum which I think he needs. I have used it before and am familiar with it.


Science
There is science in his language arts curriculum, but like his big sister Gabe loves science.
Curriculum: Moving Beyond the Page; Answers for Kids
Goals: Further develop his love for science and facts; expand his horizon into new areas of science (you can only study dinosaurs and the ocean for so many years....)
Bonus: We already own it all.


History -- US History (same as Mckenna)
This is where I have my fun. My kids LOVE history so we spend a ton of time on it. But while we are studying history we are also studying philosophy, geography, reading, science, etc. because we take history chronologically and study the people, inventions, thoughts, and  changes of the time.
Curriculum: Story of the World Vol. 3. This is my favorite History curriculum and we will use it to  keep up on what is going on in the rest of the world while America is being formed. If you buy it you must buy the CDs and Activity Books--they are amazing. Early American History, a Literature Aprroach. Gabe and Juliana will use the Primary Set and Mckenna will use the Intermediate set. Essentially, this curriculum offers good, quality literature that lets students read their way through history.
Goals: As True Blue Americans, this year feels like the culmination of our studying. I have no idea what we will do next year! We started with the earliest recorded history and have worked our way to Christopher Columbus. Now we get to discover what makes our nation so unique and wonderful. I want my kids to fall more in love with America while at the same time understanding their responsibilities as citizens. 
Bonus: You guessed it: Free! I am borrowing E.A.H. and I used last year's school money to buy STOW 3. Oh yeah!


P.E.
Gabe is playing AYSO soccer this year (his second year), and once it is over I hope to get him involved in either golf, water polo, or martial arts, depending on practice days and times.


I need to make a decision about handwriting. His printing is atrocious unless he is actually trying to write neatly, but he really wants to learn cursive. Do I make him work on his printing, teach him cursive, or teach him how to type? 

Gabriel's 7th Birthday

Images of my water breaking, our trip to the hospital, an emergency C-Section, and a dreaded blood transfusion are vividly clear in my mind. So how can it be that my baby son is SEVEN years old?

With MUCH fanfare Gabriel turned 7 last week. On Thursday, June 2 Gabe emerged from church with a very swollen thumb. He didn't cry or scream, but simply told us he had gotten his thumb all swollen. 2 appointments, X-Rays, and a week later it was still bruised and crooked, but less swollen. 

So off we went to a hand specialist, who informed us it broke all the way down the thumb, through the growth plate. Even untrained, I could see how crooked the bone was on the X-Ray. Yuck. I wasn't thrilled with the options the Dr. presented: cast it crooked and it "should" straighten itself out in the next 2 years, numb it and straighten it, or put him to sleep to straighten it. I asked if he would be willing to try to straighten the bone with no anesthesia, since Gabe's pain tolerance is incredibly high. He gave it a trial run, and Gabe was okay, so he agreed to do it. The Dr. and I both put on gloves, and he put a cast on Gabe's arm and thumb as quickly as possible. I held Gabe's face while the Dr. put the casted thumb under the X-Ray and then he yanked and torqued and pulled and twisted. For about a minute he worked and worked to get that bone to straighten. Then he pressed the cast all in nice and tight, and we compared before and after X-Rays. It was MUCH straighter. The whole time Gabe simply sucked in deep breaths, and I encouraged him to breathe deeply and relax the best he could. 

When it was over, it looked to me like the Dr. was in more pain than Gabe! He told Gabe that once a Marine passed out while he performed the same fix on him, and that Gabe is the toughest boy ever. 

The nurse was also impressed, as was I!

So here is my birthday boy with his red cast. He wanted Orange, but red was the closest we could get :o)

For His birthday dinner we had Orange Chicken and Orange Juice. And dessert was Carrot Cake and Orange Sherbert! Love this kid!

Recent Happenings...

Summer is just around the corner...right? I am anxious for a few months that are less harried and have fewer responsibilities.

Meanwhile, between grading a whole lot of essays (hundreds and hundreds), homeschooling, church responsibilities (which, in a good way, are growing and growing), and friends, we have been joyfully busy.

Our Mom's Group had an Easter egg hunt in my dear friend's backyard. 

The kids had an incredibly fun time.

Jules and on of her best buddies

I asked this cutie pie to show me her favorite egg, and this is what she did :o)

 

 

 

 

They are still best buddies!

A few weeks ago, Daniel and his AWANA staff held a pinewood derby style race

The kids loved it and it reminded me of when my dad and I did this with our YMCA group.

Mckenna is supposed to be attending a horseback riding camp, but the owners had some personal issues and have canceled or postponed it. We are waiting, hoping she gets to go, along with her good friend Courtney.

And that is all there is time for!

Before and After

Before we had kids Daniel and I would drive for hours, for fun, just to be together and go somewhere we wanted to go. We would wander around Home Depot, Best Buy, furniture stores, and ritzy malls not to shop, but to dream.  Long drives meant long talks, and meandering through the shops could take hours. In the times we did nothing our love and our friendship grew.

Today we set out on an adventure with the kids. There were five stops on our list: Drive around a neighborhood we might like to live in, donate the massive quantity of clothes and toys in the back of the car, pick up our check from our realtor (as in, our offer was not accepted), Target and Costco. 

The first 15 minutes of driving around the neighborhood were fun, especially since at every turn Juliana shouted out, "I want to live here NOW!"

After those first 15 minutes, things headed downhill.

I have to pee!
I'm hungry!
When are we going to Costco?

Then the self-entertaining began.

This is a skill my kids possess in great measure, but it's neither a quiet activity nor a gentle one. They played: Who can rip the shoe off someone's foot, who can get the hidden sticker out of someone's shirt, and how many songs can we sing at the same time?

At this point I asked Daniel if we lived in a 3 Ring Circus.

Target was fine--they each carried something and we let them browse the toy aisles for a long time--and Costco is always great fun, especially when free samples and frozen yogurt are involved. But by the time we got home, a full 3 hours later, we were all wiped out.

I looked over at my husband, scarcely able to remember when it was just the two of us, and admitted, "I thought this would be fun."

"I am having fun," he said. "This is good."

It is good. Even though before we had kids we had time to simply drive, wander, and dream, now we have cuddles, giggles, and silly games. Before we had quiet, organization, and time; now we have small hands to hold, large messes to enjoy, and the loud, magical sounds of happy children.

And while I am glad we had our children young, since we will still be young when they are gone, I don't wish those days would come quickly, for I am enjoying just being their

In the Eye of the Beholder

A little boy's version of art

Artistically Arranged

Artfully Photographed

An out of order Milestone

Honestly, I still am struggling to care about everyday things, including blogging. Between Juliana's nasty cold/bronchitis/ear infection, a new nephew I have yet to meet,  and of course Jadelyn's scary 5 days in the hospital, the mundane holds little appeal.

That said,  a very exciting thing happened this week, and I want to remember it forever.

My son drank his first glass of milk. EVER. 

We knew he was lactose intolerant at only a few weeks of age. He slept on his stomach at 2 weeks old, against common medical advice, because it was the only position he could actually sleep in; he was 4 weeks old when I cut dairy completely out of my diet, and his discomfort decreased dramatically. When he started taking some formula, the only one that worked was soy. Once he took one bite of ice cream and immediately threw up his entire dinner.

But 2 years of daily smoothies, fortified with pro-biotics and live cultures, plus age and overall health...and my son can drink milk. Even more incredible: he likes it!

Have I mentioned that Joanna is pregnant, due in about 2 months with a baby boy? It makes sleeping at the hospital even less appealing, but she has not complained. No one is complaining about anything. We only care that Jadelyn is okay.

I just wanted to share this picture of Jadelyn (and her daddy). I love it. She's such a happy girl. Oh, and she wears rainboots everyday, with every outfit. She has a few pairs, and she loves them. I saw some zebra striped ones at Target, and they made me think of her.

It seems as though she had a small seizure Monday night. They are in the hospital again tonight. Not sure what other tests they can run; so far everything has come back showing nothing.

----

Juliana is sick, and getting worse, not better. We head back to the dr. tomorrow. I feel incredibly grateful for my nebulizer, which allows my baby to breathe, and the humidifier, which makes it more comfortable for her to sleep. We discovered we can play 2 games of Princess Go Fish in the time her breathing treatment takes.

Today we read books all morning. Gabe and I started and finished 2 Magic Treehouse books. He was so happy! The girls played with Play-Doh for at least 7 hours. They made all kinds of wonderful creations I wish I had photographed.  Kenna and I braved the cold for soccer practice, and then stocked up at Costco.

----

Please don't stop praying for Jadelyn, Kyle, and Joanna.

Gabe's Christmas

If there is anything that a man can do well, I say let him do it.

Give him a chance.
~Abraham Lincoln 

I strongly desire for my son to be taught how to be a man. There are far too many boys masquerading as men in our world.

I am not the best candidate to teach him. 

Afterall, I am his Mother. His Father is excellent at this job. But I am the one home with my son all day.

Still, I can inspire him to do manly things.

So, in a moment of either sheer genius or insanity, I bought him a bow and arrow for Christmas. 

A real one.  And 2 bales of hay to shoot into.

The look on his face made me 90% sure it was genius, not crazy.

If the cat gets shot, or arrows start flying over the 10 foot wall and into car windows, I reserve the right to change my initial opinion.

 And so a new adventure in becoming a man has begun.

Thankful Challenge, Day 28

28. My kids. I know, it's redundant, but I really am. I nearly bled to death after Mckenna was born, twice. I could have missed all these years. While I was pregnant with Gabriel we got some very bad ultrasound results, both for him and for me. Those issues were all resolved, praise be to God, and even the emergency C-Section was less traumatic than it could have been. And Juliana, well, we weren't planning on another one so soon, and the doctors weren't sure we could have another one. So even though the pregnancy and delivery were relatively smooth, she is a miracle baby too.

So daily, even when I am angry or discouraged, I am more thankful than words can describe for my 3 treasures.

Thankful Challenge, Day 4

4. A sweet little guy named Gabriel. He is the joy, the even keeled peacemaker, the eager to please, extremely gifted boy that God knew I needed to balance out my strong willed and dramatic girls. He is talented in every endeavor he undertakes, rediculously good at math and memorization, and always willing to read a book to his sister or his mom.

Not Your Ordinary Halloween, Part Three

This is how much candy the kids came home with.

Yuck.

We combined bags and sorted.

  Then each kid picked 10 pieces. 

I know, we are cruel.

The rest is either trashed or sorted to give away.

And no, the kids were not mad.

Oh, and the cake? 

Mckenna won it at the cake walk.

Cuz that's what we needed.

Not Your Ordinary Halloween, Part Two

 We Held Baby Chicks

 Panned for Gold

 

Stuck ourselves to Velcro Walls

 

Jousted

 Got MORE candy than we would eat in a year, 

and that's just Gabe's

And hung out with some of our favorite new friends, including our pastor's wife (right) and crazy friend in the cow suit. Yes, those are Milk Duds in her pail :o)